Week in Review

People hate government bureaucracies. They can’t stand getting their driver’s license renewed. They hate getting the necessary approvals before making an improvement on their property. They especially hate having to deal with the IRS. Giving the choice we would all gladly have our dentists fix our cavities then endure those ordeals. Without Novocain. Because it is so frustrating dealing with a slow-moving, inefficient and inept government bureaucracy. Which is why people don’t want national health care.

Obamacare is already showing what a slow-moving, inefficient and inept government bureaucracy it is. From the abysmal rollout. To those 22,000 people trying to get that slow-moving, inefficient and inept government bureaucracy to correct the mistakes that bureaucracy made. They submitted complaints through the proper channels. Where they promptly disappeared in the system and went ignored. Something we can expect more of with this new slow-moving, inefficient and inept government bureaucracy. As it is a common feature of a national health care system (see NHS watchdog accused of ‘throwing away’ complaints by Laura Donnelly posted 2/3/2014 on The Telegraph).

An NHS watchdog has been accused of failing thousands of patients and bereaved relatives after admitting it fully investigated less than 400 of 16,000 patient complaints made last year.

The figures emerged as a leaked report, seen by The Telegraph, discloses a litany of errors investigating a death at the heart of the Morecambe Bay hospital scandal, where up to 16 babies died amid poor care.

Last night bereaved parents said the Health Service Ombudsman – the body with ultimate responsibility for complaints against the NHS – was “a disaster for patients” while health experts said the organisation was “virtually ignoring” the desperate pleas of families seeking explanations for poor care.

The watchdog’s own records disclose that during the year 2012/13, less than three per cent of complaints which came to them were “fully investigated”.

Unlike Obamacare these complaints are not about data entry errors. These complaints are about substandard care resulting in patient harm. And death. But what happens when the bungling bureaucracy investigates itself? They tend to circle the wagons to protect their beloved bureaucracy. While failing the people. Which will happen with Obamacare. Where they are already circling the wagons to protect their beloved bureaucracy over data entry errors. Imagine the callousness that will enter the system when people suffer harm and death from substandard care.

Of course we can trust the government to prevent this from happening. After all have they let us down yet in the investigation of their ineptitude and callousness over Benghazi? And let us not forget how they got to the bottom of IRS targeting conservative groups to silence them during the 2012 election. That thing where there wasn’t even a “smidgen of corruption.” Yet the woman in charge of that pleaded the Fifth Amendment. Which defendants do for only one reason. So they don’t incriminate themselves. But there wasn’t even a “smidgen of corruption” here.

Is it any wonder 22,000 people can’t get someone to respond to their complaints? Or that government bureaucracies rarely do a good job when they investigate themselves? So get ready for a similar fate the British people are suffering with their NHS. But instead of 16,000 complaints being ignored there will be about 80,000 complaints that will be ignored. Or more. As we have about 5 times the population the UK has. And we don’t have the 66 years of experience in doing national health care they have.

Week in Review

Obamacare is but a waypoint on the way to true national health care. Just like they have in Britain. Where they’ve been doing national health care since 1948. Which means if anyone is doing national health care right it has to be the British. For they’ve been doing it for some 65 years. So just how well are they doing it? Well, suffice it to say they can make some improvements (see How many reviews does the NHS need? by Nick Triggle posted 8/6/2013 on BBC News Health).

NHS reviews are getting a bit like buses. Miss one and you don’t need to wait long for another to come round the corner.

A month ago there was the Cavendish Review into healthcare assistants, and then two weeks later the Keogh Review into mortality rates, which led to 11 trusts being put into special measures, was published.

Now it is Prof Don Berwick’s review on patient safety.

All three were commissioned off the back of the Francis Inquiry into the Stafford Hospital scandal…

The Francis Inquiry made 290 recommendations. The three follow-up reports have brought that number to almost 500 and there is still a fourth, on complaints handling, to come.

And yet there is still confusion over what the government is doing on issues such as minimum staffing, criminalising neglect, improving nurse training and introducing a robust system of oversight for healthcare assistants.

And that’s doing national health care well. Imagine the number of recommendations if they were only starting out with national health care? Things would probably be a lot worse without those 65 years of experience. Something Obamacare doesn’t have. Which probably explains why they are having so much trouble getting it up and running.

So if the left gets their way they will use Obamacare as a pathway to national health care. Like they have in Britain. And we, too, can expect a flurry of reports on substandard care. And hundreds of recommendations to improve that substandard care. Of course we could just go back to the way things used to be. And keep health care in the private sector. Where there may have been problems. But there was not a flurry of reports on substandard care. Only about people who couldn’t afford the outstanding level of quality in our health care system. It seems such a shame to destroy the one just so you can afford to give substandard care to everyone.